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How TO Live 



ADELINE KNAPP 







Class OP3 7 

Book_ Jlki 



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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



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HOW TO LIVE 



A MANUAL OF HYGIENE 



FOR USE IN THE SCHOOLS OF THE 
PHILIPPINE ISLANDS 



BY 



ADELINE KIS^APP 

AUTHOR OF ''the STORY OF THE PHILIPPINES' 



ILLUSTRATED 




SILVER, BURDETT AND COMPANY 

NEW YORK BOSTON CHICAGO 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS, 

Two Copies Received 

MAY. 31 1902 

C0PVRH3HT ENTRY 

CLASS ^^^0<c. Ho, 
COPY B. 



Copyright, 1902, 
By silver, BURDETT AND COMPANY 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER 


PAGE 


I. 


The Human Body . 


7 


11. 


The Story of Water 


. 19 


III. 


About Food 


. 30 


lY. 


All Around the House . 


. U 


y. 


Our Own Selves .... 


. 63 


YI. 


Public Hygiene 


. 81 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



The Skull, Chest, and Abdomen 

The Circulation 

The Wrong AYay to Carry a Baby 

Governor-general Carriedo 

Pumping Station, Manila Waterworks 

The AYrong Place for a Well 

A Badly Arranged Market 

A Market as it should be 

An Unhealthful Street . 

Clothes drying on the Ground 

The Best Way to dry Clothes 

The Skin magnified .... 

The Ear 

Gate covered with Unhealthful Mold 



8 
11 
16 
19 
20 
23 
31 
36 
46 
59 
60 
66 
77 
84 




H0W T0 LIVE. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE HUMAN BODY. 

?N America, where they make the 
best locomotive engines in the 
world, they say that the life of 
an engine is about twenty years. 
That is, when they build an engine, they 
know about how much work it will have 
to do and what usage it is likely to have. 
They know that the engine is strong enough 
to do such work and stand such usage for 
twenty years. So they say that the length 
of the engine's life is twenty years. 

Now, a man's body is, in its way, a 
machine. It is made to do certain work, 
and if it has the right sort of care, it 
ought to be healthy and do the work re- 
quired of it, to the end of the man's life. 



HOW TO LIVE, 



It is estimated that the natural life of a 
man is seventy years. This little book is 
intended to tell us how to live and some- 
thing about caring for our bodies so that 

they shall last as long 
as possible, and be ready 
and able to do their work 
in the world. 

In a general way, we 
may compare the human 
body to three closed boxes, 
one above another. These 
boxes are the skull, the 
chest, and the abdomen. 
Each one has its own 
special contents, formed to 
do a special work for the 
body. The skull is a hard. 

The Skull, Chest, and bOUy CaSC mado tO COUtalu 
Abdomen. i i • rm • • 

the brain. I his is where 
the mind lives, and it is part of the work 
of the mind to take care of the body and 
direct its movements. The brain main- 
tains a sort of telegraph station within 




THE HUMAN BODY, 9 

itself. Wires, which we call nerves, branch 
out from it to all parts of the body, and the 
brain is constantly receiving messages over 
these wires and sending others telling the 
muscles what to do. For instance, if the 
hand comes in contact with something hot, 
a message instantly goes to the brain, tell- 
ing this fact. The brain sends back word 
to take the hand away, and the hand is 
withdrawn. But all this is done so quickly 
that the hand seems to be withdrawn the 
very instant that it comes in contact with 
the fire. The skull is supported by the 
backbone, which- connects it with the second 
closed box. 

This second cavity is the chest, which 
is really a sort of cage formed by the ribs, 
the backbone, and the breastbone. In the 
chest are the heart and the lungs. The heart 
is an engine. Put your hand over it and 
you can feel the steady throb of its beat, 
day and night. It is working all the time, 
whether you are awake or asleep. The 
business of the heart is to send blood to all 



10 HOW TO LIVE. 

parts of the body. It does this by driving 
the blood through tubes, called arteries 
and veins, that go all over the body. The 
arteries are deep down among the muscles,, 
but some of the veins are close to the 
surface. We can see blue veins at the 
temples and on the backs of our hands. 
All the blood goes to every part of the 
body once in two minutes. 

The food which a person eats is acted 
upon by the digestive fluids in the body 
and is turned over and dissolved until it 
becomes fluid itself. It is then taken up 
by the blood and carried to different parts 
of the body, so that each organ and muscle 
gets what it needs. We shall learn, a little 
later, just how the food gets into the blood. 
We have seen that the heart sends the 
blood out through vessels, which are called 
arteries. This blood starts from the heart 
bright red, full of fresh air and food for 
the body. As it goes on its journey, each 
tissue takes from it what is needed to keep 
that part healthy, and at last the blood has 



THE HUMAN BODY. 



11 



given out all the good things with which it 

was loaded. It no longer carries food and 

fresh air, but is full of the 

impurities taken in on 

its journey. If something 

were not done to cleanse 

it, the man would die. 

The impure blood flows 
from the arteries into the 
veins through tiny canals. 
The veins are tubes some- 
thing like the arteries, and 
they usually lie beside the 
arteries. They and the 
arteries are like the two 
tracks of a great railway 
line, one going from the 
main station, the heart, 
the other coming back. 

But the blood in the 
veins is not like that in 
the arteries. Instead of being bright red, 
and healthy-looking, it is dark colored. It 
flows more slowly, and it is full of impurities 




The Circulation of the 
Blood. 

The blood is forced by the 
heart through the arteries 
(black lines), and returns 
to it through the veins 
(dotted lines). 



12 HOW TO LIVE, 

which it is carrying away from the body. 
The veins carry this blood to the right side 
of the heart, and the heart sends it to the 
lungs. There are many blood vessels in the 
lungs, and they are divided into branches 
running in every direction through the lung 
tissue. When we draw in a deep breath, 
we fill the lungs with fresh air. This is at 
once taken up by the impure blood in the 
branching blood vessels. The impurities 
are breathed out with the air that leaves our 
lungs, and the blood once more becomes 
bright red and full of new life. In this way 
the blood is purified. Then it is sent back 
to the heart, all ready to start out again 
through the body. The whole journey is 
made every two minutes. 

The third box, which we call the abdom- 
inal cavity, is separated from the chest by 
a broad, thin muscle, the diaphragm. The 
abdomen has a hard floor of bone, but the 
walls are soft, being made up only of the 
muscles and the lower ribs. In the abdo- 
men are the stomach and intestines, the liver, 



THE HUMAN BODY, 13 

kidneys, and other organs of which \Ye shall 
learn later. 

Food is carried from the mouth to the 
stomach by the muscular tube which passes 
through the chest just back of the breast- 
bone. This tube is called the esophagus. 
With the mouth, the stomach, and the bowels, 
it forms what is called the food canal. 

As soon as the food enters the mouth, it be- 
gins to turn from solid into liquid form, so 
that the blood can take it up. We chew the 
food, so that it may become mixed with the 
saliva in the mouth ; then it is swallowed and 
goes into the stomach. This is a kind of sack 
which holds about a quart. Just as saliva 
is secreted in the mouth and acts upon the 
food, so in the stomach there is a fluid called 
the gastric juice, which aids digestion. The 
gastric juice mixes with the food, dissolves 
it, and makes it soft, so that it can pass 
through the lower opening of the stomach 
into the intestines. Here there are other 
juices which dissolve still more of the food, 
until at last it is all liquid and looks like 
milk. 



14 HOW TO LIVE, 

Now it is taken up by the blood through 
tiny canals that reach down into the intes- 
tines and absorb it. But it is not really a 
part of the blood yet. It must be changed 
still further, so the blood carries it to the 
liver. Here it is made a part of the blood, 
and is able to nourish all parts of the body. 

All the food that cannot be dissolved is 
indigestible, and the body must get rid of it. 
Some of it passes off as solid matter, by way 
of the bowels; some is got rid of through 
the urine; some goes out with the breath, as 
we have seen; and a great deal goes off in 
the perspiration. This is why we need to 
bathe our bodies and to wash our clothing. 
The perspiration brings the bad matter to 
the surface, where it clings to the skin and 
the clothing until it is removed by washing. 

But this series of boxes, which we call the 
head and trunk of the body, would be very 
helpless without the legs and arms to carry 
them about and to wait upon them. Taken 
all together, the head, trunk, and limbs form 
the body. The framework, which we call 



THE HUMAN BODY, 15 

the skeleton, is made up of bones. These 
bones are like the framework of a house, — 
they keep the body upright and support the 
muscles. In young people the bones are soft 
and elastic. A baby often has falls that 
would break the bones of a grown person, 
but the baby's bones are not broken because 
they are not yet hardened. This is an ad- 
vantage, for children get a great many more 
falls than grown people do, and it would be 
hard for them if the bones were broken as 
easily. 

But if children's bones do not break, they 
bend, and it is easy for them to grow into 
bad shape. If children do not sit up straight 
they become round-shouldered, and many 
children get into the habit of carrying one 
shoulder higher than the other. Often, too, 
they are careless about walking and sitting 
properly. 

In this country, where nearly all weights 
are carried on the head, we rarely see a man 
who does not carry his head and shoulders 
well. He learns in childhood to keep his 



.16 



HOW 'TO LIVE. 



shoulders even and to hold his head up. But 
there is one custom of the country which 
prevents the people from walking well. This 
is the practice of carrying little children on 

the hip. It is 
bad for the chil- 
dren, as it strains 
the muscles of 
the lower part of 
the back, and 
bends the soft lit- 
tle bones so that 
they do not grow 
straight as they 
naturally would. 
It is bad, too, for 
the person who 
carries the child. 
The body is thrown to one side, the weight 
of the child presses the soft organs of the 
abdomen downward, and the effect is often 
serious. It is very bad indeed for one child 
to carry another this way. Babies should be 
carried in the arms, as European children are. 




The Wrong Way to Carry a Baby. 



THE HUMAN BODY. 17 

When we walk, we should let the weight 
of the body rest on the soles of the feet. 
We should lift the foot free from the ground 
and carry it straight forward when we 
step. Some day, if you will study the dif- 
ference between the walk of a good horse 
and that of a carabao, you will see how a 
man should walk. The horse lifts his hind 
foot, carries it straight forward, and sets it 
down almost exactly in the print his front 
foot made. The carabao lifts his hind foot, 
swings it outward in an awkward curve, 
brings it back into line, and sets it down in 
much the same way as the horse. But he 
loses a little time swinging it outward, and 
lie looks very clumsy, as well. 

Now, some people, instead of walking like 
horses, walk like carabaos. They scuffle 
along the street with dragging steps, rolling 
their hips, and swinging tlieir feet outward, 
just as these animals do. They look lazy 
and clumsy, and as if they could hardly hold 
their bodies together. People should learn 
to walk well while they are young. 



18 HOW TO LIVE, 

The bones are covered with muscles, which 
are what we mean when we say the flesh. 
There are a great many muscles in the body. 
They give it shape and move it about. When 
we bend an arm or a finger, we do it by the 
action of the muscles. The brain tells the 
muscles how to act, as we have seen. It 
sends messages along the nerves, and the 
muscles obey. We can make our muscles 
strong by exercise, but if we do not use them 
enough, they will grow weak and soft. 

QUESTIONS. 

How does the brain send messages to the different 
parts of the body ? 

What does the heart do? 

What does the blood take up from the body? 

How does it get rid of impurities? 

What becomes of food after it is swallowed? 

How are the bones of a child different from those of 
a grown person ? 

How does it hurt the bones to sit or stand badly ? 

Why should we sit up straight? 

How ought babies to be carried? 

Why is it hurtful to carry them on the hip ? 

What do we call the muscles ? 

What are their uses ? 

How can we make our muscles strong ? 



CHAPTER II. 

THE STORY OF WATER. 




Governor-general Carriedo 
Who gave Manila her waterworks. 

ANY years ago there was a wise 
governor-general in the Philip- 
jjine Islands, who left a large 
sum of money to the city of 
Manila. This money was to be put out at 
interest and allowed to increase, and in his 
will the governor-general directed that when 
there should be a large enough sum, it should 

19 




20 



HOW TO LIVE. 



be used to build waterworks for the city of 
Manila. 

The waterworks were not built until a 
hundred years after the governor-general 
died. In 1872 another wise governor-gen- 




PuMPiNG Station, Manila Waterworks. 



eral came to the islands, and learning of 
this money which had been left, he at once 
set to work to provide the city with a water 
supply. This was one of the best things 
that ever happened to Manila. In the trop- 



THE STORY OF WATER. 21 

ic8 nothing is more important than pure 
water. 

There is a great deal of water in the body. 
In fact, three fourths of the body is made up 
of Avater. It is in the blood, in the muscles, 
and in the bones. There is even some water 
in the enamel of the teeth, which is the 
hardest substance in the w^hole body. The 
digestive juices, the saliva, and the different 
intestinal juices, all help to dissolve some 
part of the food which w^e take. To obtain 
this power to dissolve the food, they depend 
upon w^ater. 

When a man is thirsty, it seems to him 
that his throat is dry. But dryness of the 
throat is only a sign by which the body makes 
known its need. Thirst is the cry of the 
fluids and tissues for water. It means that 
some part of the body is suffering for the 
precious fluid. 

If we look at a drop of water under a 
microscope, which magnifies it many times, 
we shall see in the w^ater a great number of 
moving specks which are really little animals. 



22 HOW TO LIVE. 

The animals are so small that thousands of 
them can live in a single drop of water as 
happily as they could in a whole ocean of 
room. They are called germs. Some of 
them are wholesome : they help to keep the 
water bright and sparkling and sweet, and 
make it pleasant to the taste. But some of 
them are very harmful : they produce many 
kinds of disease, most of which cause death. 

It is because of these germs that people, 
particularly in tropical countries, have to be 
so careful about the water they drink. The 
purest water that we have is clean rain 
water. This is the vapor which rises from 
the earth and from the surface of the sea. 
It ascends into the air until it strikes a cur- 
rent of cold air, when it is turned into mois- 
ture and falls as rain. 

We can catch the rain water in cisterns 
or other vessels; and this water we may 
drink without boiling, if we are careful 
to keep the cisterns clean. The cistern, to 
be perfectly sweet, should be emptied and 
cleaned at least once every two weeks. 



THE STORY OF WATER. 



23 



In this country nearly all the drinking 
water comes from wells. Well water may 
be very good, but the chances are that it is 
full of impurities. The water from the wells 
is rain water which has soaked into the 
earth and has collected in the well. But the 




The Wrong Place for a Well. 



earth is always full of impurities. It is like 
a great sponge through which the water flows, 
and the water is pretty sure to take up some 
impurities as it sinks through the earth. 

If a well is near an outhouse or stable, or 
a place where cattle are kept, the water that 
filters through this earth will carry with it 
germs from these places. A well should 



24 HOW TO LIVE. 

always be on higher ground than any out- 
buildings. It should be some distance from 
the house, and no slops or anything emptied 
from the house should be put near it. No 
drainage of any kind should run near it. 

In the city of Pittsburg, in the United 
States, some years ago, there was an epidemic 
of typhoid fever. Many thousands of people 
died, and at last the legislature of Pennsyl- 
vania appointed a committee to investigate 
the cause of the epidemic. This comniittee 
began to study the source of the city water 
supply. They traced it far up the moun- 
tains, many miles away, until they found a 
certain little stream emptying into a large 
river which supplied the city. Living on 
the banks of this stream was a family where 
there was a case of typhoid fever. The slops 
from the house had been thrown into the 
stream and had so poisoned the water that 
thousands of people in far-away Pittsburg 
died of typhoid fever. 

In Manila there was once a great cholera 
epidemic, during which more than thirty 



THE STORY OF WATER. 25 

thousand Filipinos in the city and province 
of Manila died ; many Spanish people died 
also. During the worst of the epidemic the 
death rate was at least a thousand every day. 
But only one Englishman died, and it is said 
that his death was due to his own careless- 
ness in drinking impure water. 

If everybody in the city had boiled and 
filtered the drinking water, as the Americans 
and the English did, nearly all of these thirty 
thousand people would have escaped death. 

What has been said of the impurities col- 
lected by water passing through the earth is 
especially true of the water which supplies 
Manila. The ground all about the city has 
been so long occupied by large numbers of 
people, the drainage has been so poor and 
so many impurities have been cast out, that 
the soil for a great distance around the city 
is a mass of decay. To stir up the earth, as 
when digging and laying pipes, makes the 
men who do it feverish and often ill, because 
of the gases rising from the soil. We may 
judge from this how bad the water must be 



26 HOW TO LIVE. 

that drains through the earth and is col- 
lected in the wells of the city. Even the 
water in the Carriedo water pipes cannot be 
said to be pure. It comes from a river far 
from the city. On the banks of this river 
are many native villages, and the people 
throw all sorts of refuse into the stream. 
They wash their clothes in it, and bathe 
themselves, their horses, and their carabaos 
there. For this reason the water should be 
purified before we drink it. 

When the Americans first came to Manila 
the city was not kept as clean as it is now. 
This is one reason why there wxre so 
many deaths in Manila, and because of the 
high death rate, the Americans at once set 
to work to clean the city. To do this cost 
the lives of many American soldiers, who 
died of fever caused by bad gases from the 
earth ; but since it was done, the death rate 
in Manila is less than it ever was before. 

But even yet the death rate is greater 
than it would be, if everybody would 
be careful about food and drink. The 



THE STORY OF WATER. 27 

greater number of those who die are little 
children. Indeed, one third of all the deaths 
in Manila are of children who die of a single 
complaint. This is the terrible fits from 
which we so often see little babies suffering. 
The fits are caused by trouble in the stomach 
and bowels, arising from bad food and drink. 
Sometimes the little one dies because it is 
worn out by the pain it has suffered. Some- 
times the brain is affected by the stomach 
trouble ; but the true cause of death in every 
such case is impure water or the wrong 
kind of food. Most of the trouble comes 
from the water which the children drink. 

Not even a grown person ought to drink 
w^ater that has not been boiled. It is not 
safe, for the germs of many of the tropical 
diseases are found in the water. All of these 
germs are killed by that degree of heat which 
we call the boiling point. No less heat than 
this will kill them. 

It is not enough merely to heat the water ; 
it must really boil for at least five minutes 
after it begins to bubble and simmer. It 



28 HOW TO LIVE. 

ought then to be strained through a clean 
cloth and put at once into a banga or some 
other of the jars used to contain water. The 
jar should be clean, and should have a cover. 
If it is hung in a draft of air, the water will 
become cool enough to drink. 

The jars used to hold water should be of 
ware that will ''sweat'' after the liquid has 
been in them for some time. That is, the 
outside should be covered with beads of 
moisture which have crept through the sides. 
This sort of jar keeps the water cool and 
lets the air get to it. Water, after it has 
been boiled, is tasteless and flat, and until 
it again takes up oxygen from the air, it is 
not so pleasant to drink, or so digestible as 
it was before boiling. 

We have seen how important water is to 
life, and we cannot have too high an idea of 
the importance of its being pure. It is not 
enough that water looks clear and sparkling. 
It may look like crystal and yet be full of 
poisonous germs. The only way to be cer- 
tain that it is pure is to boil it and then see 



THE STORY OF WATER. 29 

that no further impurities get into it before 
it is used. 

QUESTIONS. 

What is thirst ? 

What is the proportion of water in the body ? 
What is the purest sort of water we have ? 
How does water become unfit for drinking ? 
How may it be purified and made fit to drink ? 
How should drinking water be kept ? 




CHAPTER III. 

ABOUT FOOD. 

|HALL we go to market to-day? 
Let us go to one of the large 
new buildings that the govern- 
ment has put up in Manila, to 
be used as markets. They are well fitted 
for this purpose. They have cement floors, 
which can be washed every day, and clean, 
well-built stalls, where goods are sold. The 
floor of a market should be washed often, 
and every bit of waste matter should be 
carried off. If this is not done faithfully, 
the food sold there spoils and becomes 
unfit for use. 

What quantities of fruit ! It would take 
a long time to count all these bunches of 
bananas. The mangoes are in season now, 
and look very tempting. It is not well to 
eat too many of them at the beginning of 

30 



ABOUT FOOD. 



31 



the season, however, and we shouki be sure 
that those which we do eat are ripe and 




A Badly Arranged ^Iarket. 



sound. Unripe fruit is very hurtful, and so 
is fruit which is too ripe, which has begun 
to decay. Some of these bananas, for in- 



32 HOW TO LIVE. 

stance, are so black and so soft that no one 
should think of trying to eat them. In 
some countries a merchant who tried to sell 
such fruit would soon find himself stopped 
from selling any fruit at all. The law would 
not allow him to offer poison for sale, and 
decayed fruit is poison. 

We will buy some of these sound, clean- 
looking bananas, and a few oranges this 
morning. We will choose oranges that are 
of a fine, rich green, not too hard, but firm 
and of good weight. Oranges that feel light 
in the hand are dry and not wholesome. 

Here are radishes and lettuce, for salad ; 
but if we buy these, we must be sure that 
they are well washed in boiled water before 
we eat them. There are little creatures, so 
small that they cannot be seen without a 
strong microscope, that live among the let- 
tuce and other green leaves. These tiny 
creatures are the cause of the worst form of 
dysentery. All sorts of vegetables which 
we eat raw should be washed clean, and it is 
of no use to wash them in unboiled water, 



ABOUT FOOD. 33 

as the amoeba (which is the little creature's 
name) may be in that, too. 

We need camotes to-day, and here are 
some tine ones. We will not buy them, how- 
ever. Why ? Do you not see that some one 
has been chewing betel-nut, and has spit 
close beside them, and the camotes are all 
spattered with the red stain? 

It is a terrible thing that not even our 
markets can be kept clean from this bad 
habit of so many people. In some parts of 
the world the man who spit upon the side- 
walk, the floor of a car, or in any public 
building would be arrested and taken to 
prison. This may seem to some a hard 
punishment for what many people think is 
a small oflense. We know, however, that 
many diseases are caused by this practice, 
and the man who willfully does anything 
which puts his fellows in danger from dis- 
ease does as great wrong as he who en- 
dangers their lives in any other way. 

Many people have catarrh, bronchitis, and 
consumption ; all such diseases can be given 



34 HOW TO LIVE, 

to others in this way. The air can become 
poisoned, so that other people catch the 
disease. People in older countries have 
learned that if sick persons are careless 
about spitting in public places, they often 
endanger the lives of others ; so it is quite 
right to compel all to stop this bad habit 
and to punish them if they continue in it. 

Constant spitting is a bad habit in other 
ways. The saliva is meant to help digest 
the food. If one gets into the senseless 
habit of spitting all the time, the saliva is 
wasted and the digestion hurt. Then, too, 
it is an uncleanly habit. It makes floors 
and sidewalks filthy, and people who have 
been well brought up always have a feeling 
of disgust when they see any one spit in 
public places. If one must spit, he should 
do so in private, where no one need be dis- 
gusted by his act. Certainly no one who has 
regard for decency would ever spit upon the 
floor of a market. 

We should make sure that all vegetables 
which we buy are fresh and in good condition. 



ABOUT FOOD. 35 

Food the least bit decayed should never be 
eaten. It is very dangerous in this climate, 
where people are more likely than in colder 
countries to have trouble of the stomach 
and bowels. Not even cooking will make 
decayed vegetables fit to eat. The poison 
in them irritates the lining of the food 
canal and makes us sick. Besides, there is 
very little nourishment in poor vegetables ; 
so that if they are eaten, the blood gets thin 
and cannot feed the body. 

Now that we have fruit and salad, we will 
buy some camotes and gabi, and some squash, 
here at this stall where everything seems so 
clean. Some tomatoes, too, but we will not 
buy any of the beans to-day; they seem soft 
and flabby, and we may be sure that they 
are not fresh. 

Meat ? Yes, by and by ; but we shall do 
better to get that elsewhere. It is bad for 
meat to lie in the open air as it does here. 
Meat should be killed at least twenty-four 
hours before it is eaten, and if it is kept so 
long, it must be on ice. Otherwise, it spoils 



36 



HOW TO LIVE. 



in a very few hours. Meat should never be 
left where flies can light on it, and you see 
that the meat here is covered with flies. 




A Market as it should be. 



Flies are great carriers of disease, and 
often take germs from place to place on their 
feet. Some of these flies may have just 
left places where there is fever or cholera, 
or smallpox, and they can easily leave 
the germs of these diseases on the meat 



ABOUT FOOD. 37 

where tliey next alight. So you see we 
should be very careful where we buy meat, 
and what sort we buy. 

There is plenty of poultry in the market to- 
day, — chickens, ducks and pigeons, all alive, 
and dealers all anxious to sell. If we buy 
a chicken, we should get it home as carefully 
as we can, and it should be allowed to rest 
and get over its fright before it is killed. 
Then it should be killed as quietly and 
quickly as possible, as otherwise the meat 
will be feverish and bad for food. It should 
be killed some hours before it is needed for 
food, so that the flesh may cool. To kill it 
just before cooking, as is almost always done 
in this country, is a very bad custom, as 
flesh so killed is not wholesome. 

Here are the fish stalls ; and here are the 
fish, most of them alive and flopping about. 
Fish caught in the river should not be 
bought unless they are alive ; fresh-water 
fish spoil so quickly that unless alive when 
bought, they are not likely to be fit for food. 
Deep-sea fish may be bought dead, and are 



38 HOW TO LIVE. 

safe to eat if the gills are bright red and the 
scales clean and shiny. If the gills look dull 
and bluish, we should never think of bu}dng 
the fish ; for it has been out of the water too 
long. Crabs and other shellfish should al- 
ways be bought alive, unless they are already 
cooked and frozen, as we see them in the 
cold storage house. Then they must be kept 
on ice until they are made ready for the table. 
But under the very best circumstances shell- 
fish should be sparingly used in this country, 
as they are the cause of much trouble of the 
digestion. 

We will buy some rice to-day, but we must 
look at it carefully first. Good rice is clean 
and white. It is free from mold, and there 
should be no musty smell about it. If it 
has any such smell, we will not buy it, for 
it is unfit for food. It ought not to be fed, 
even to the chickens. Moldy and dirty rice 
is a common cause of the disease called 
beri-beri, which is so often fatal in tropical 
countries. 

Many people are not prudent about select- 



ABOUT FOOD. 39 

ing and cooking their rice. They are careless 
and often bny mnsty rice, nor do they cook 
it long enough. They eat it half cooked, 
and many people like it a little burned. 
Prepared this way the rice is hard to digest, 
and is irritating to the system and to the 
food canal. 

A grown man who is well and strong 
needs a certain amount of food every day, 
to keep him in health. The body requires 
water, fat, sugar, and albumen, and some 
mineral salts. Albumen is a substance rich 
in food for the body, of which it makes up a 
large part. The white of egg is almost pure 
albumen, and therefore eggs are very good for 
food. Milk, which is the only food very 
young babies should have, contains all the 
things which the body needs, and in just 
the right cpiantities. It has water, sugar, 
fat, albumen, and some mineral matter. Meat 
has albumen and fat, but no sugar, and fish 
is similar to meat in this respect. 

Most of the sugar we take into the body 
we really eat in the form of starch, but the 



40 HOW TO LIVE. 

saliva in the mouth turns the starch into 
sugar. The secretions of the liver do this 
also. Rice is a starchy food. It contains a 
great deal of starch, and before we eat it, 
it should be well cooked, so that it is soft 
enough to be acted upon by the saliva and 
turned into sugar; otherwise, the liver has all 
this work to do. Corn, potatoes, meal, bread, 
are all starchy foods, and we get with them 
nearly all of the mineral substances needed ; 
but to most of our food we need to add a 
little salt. 

Bananas and other fruits, when they are 
ripe, all have sugar, and in this country people 
are fortunate in having the sugar cane to eat. 
If one does not eat too much of this, it is 
pleasant and wholesome, and it is very good 
for the teeth ; it makes them white and 
keeps them healthy. 

Besides what he takes in with his solid 
food, a man should drink three pints of water 
a day. If he drinks tea or coffee he will get 
some water with these, and so will not need 
so much, but three pints of liquid are needed 



ABOUT FOOD, 41 

daily to keep the body well. People in this 
country drink also the sap of the cocoanut 
tree and the water contained in the cocoanut 
itself. These are both good and wholesome, 
when fresh. But if they are not fresh, they 
can do much harm. Why this is we shall 
see in another chapter. 

People who live in the tropics need less 
fat than those in colder countries. Away in 
the frozen north the Esquimaux eat great 
quantities of fat meat and oil, and even 
tallow, from which candles are made. They 
need much fat to keep them warm. In the 
tropics, on the other hand, people should eat 
but little fat. Lean meat is good, especially 
beef, but pork raised here is very unwhole- 
some. The pigs themselves eat all manner 
of unclean things. They are the natural 
scavengers of the country, and the food which 
they eat makes their flesh unfit for us. 

The flesh of the carabao is not so good as 
beef. It gives really very little nourishment, 
and is tough and dry. The mutton which is 
grown in these islands is not so good as it 



42 HOW TO LIVE. 

might be if more pains were taken. Sheep 
ought to be shorn twice a year, not only for 
the value of the wool, but because it adds 
to the comfort of the sheep and makes the 
flesh better. Dry and salt meats are of little 
value here, and they spoil quickly. 

The fish of the Philippine Islands are rich 
in albumen, which the body needs. They 
should always be fresh, as we have seen, and 
should alwavs be eaten hot. Even cooked 
fish, after it has grown cold, is not good for 
food. It is likely to produce skin diseases 
and certain kinds of poisoning. Many of 
the shellfish cause this disease also, par- 
ticularly the crabs of these islands. In 
fact, shellfish should all be used sparingly, 
as they are not easy to digest and are often 
the cause of diarrhoea and dysentery. 

Babies and very young children ought to 
be fed carefully in this country. Yet fre- 
quently we see tiny babies eating fish and 
meat, and often raw vegetables and green 
fruit. The stomachs of such little children 
are very small and weak. Their natural food 



ABOUT FOOD, 43 

is milk, and if we give them anything else 
than this, we should choose it very carefully. 
It should be the best that we can get, per- 
fectly clean, and easy to digest. Not until 
people are more careful about these matters 
will the children in the islands have a fair 
chance to grow up to healthy manhood and 
womanhood. 

QUESTIONS. 

Why is fruit that is too ripe unfit to eat ? 

How do we select oranges that are fresh and good ? 

Why should we be careful to wash all fruit and 
vegetables before we eat them ? 

Why is spitting in public places a filthy habit? 

How may it be dangerous to others? 

Why should meat not hang in the open air in tropical 
countries ? 

How do flies carry disease ? 

Why is it injurious to eat meat that has just been killed? 

Why is it not a good plan to buy dead fish ? 

Why are crabs and shellfish a poor sort of food ? 

What does good rice look like ? 

What kinds of rice should be avoided ? 

What sort of food and drink are best for the tropics ? 

How ought babies and young children to be fed ? 




CHAPTER IV. 

ALL AROUND THE HOUSE. 

^^HE English people have a saying : 
"^ ''Every man's house is his cas- 
^p tie.'' In his own house a man 
^"^-^""^^^ ought to be safe, if he is to be 
so anywhere, and there he ought to feel sure 
that his family is safe. With his strong 
right arm he will keep all enemies away ; 
will fight, if need be, for the safety of his 
castle. It would be a very mean man who 
would not do this. We should think even 
a child a coward who did not help to defend 
his home. But while we defend the front 
door, we must not let enemies creep in at 
the back. Now, the deadliest enemy of hu- 
man life in the tropics is dirt. We have to 
fight hard against dirt of every sort. Let us 
see, to-day, about building a house and keep- 
ing our enemy out of it. 

44 



ALL AROUND THE HOUSE. 45 

Every country must have its own particu- 
lar kind of a house. The house suitable for 
a cold country would not do at all in the 
country where we are now. We do not 
need walls built so as to keep out cold and 
winds. We have no use for fires to fight 
off frost and chill. But houses in coun- 
tries where the winters are cold and snowy 
must have thick walls; they must have 
carpets on the floors and heavy curtains at 
the windows. There must be fires in the 
houses, to keep people warm. If the houses 
were not warm, people would suffer from 
cold and many would die. 

Nevertheless, while they do not need to 
be built for warmth, our houses in the tropics 
ought to be as carefully built as are the 
homes in winter lands. That they are not 
so built is one reason why so many little 
children die here, — many more than in 
America, for instance. 

First of all, since we are to build a house, 
we must have a good place for it. We will 
not build on low land if we can help it. 



46 



HOW TO LIVE. 



Neither will we build near standing water. 
We see a great many houses upon land that 
is almost always wet, but they are very un- 
healthful for the people who have to live in 
them. If our house is to be a healthful place 




An Unhealthful Street. 
Without pavement or gutters. 

for us, we must build it on firm land that is 
well drained. Some day the whole city of 
Manila, w^ithin the walls, will have to be 
raised several feet higher than it is at pres- 
ent, to get it far enough above the low, un- 



ALL ABOUND THE HOUSE. 47 

healthful land it now stands on. The streets 
must be made wider, too, so that the sun 
can shine upon the house walls. The nar- 
row streets are nearly always damp and 
unhealthful. Manila will never be a healthy 
place until these things are done. 

But outside of the walls, and in the coun- 
try, we can pick our plots and prepare our 
building sites. The fine, beautiful house and 
the little nipa cottage can be equal in one 
respect ; that is, both can have clean, health- 
ful surroundings. 

The living-rooms of houses in this coun- 
try should never be close to the ground. 
The land on which a house stands should be 
well drained and kept dry. This, however, 
is not all that should be done to prepare 
a building spot. In tropical countries bad 
gases rise from the earth at night, and we 
should do what we can to prevent these 
from getting into the house. The ground 
where the house is to stand should be dug 
down at least a foot and filled in with hard 
cement. This will keep it dry and prevent 



48 HOW TO LIVE. 

the earth -gases from rising through the 
floors. Besides this foundation, the house 
should have cement gutters running all 
around it, to carry off surface water. The 
foundation walls should rise from the 
cement bottom to a height of at least six 
feet. 

The ground floor may be used as a place 
to store carriages, furniture, and other things 
of that sort ; but it is unsafe to keep horses 
or other animals there. All the bad odors 
and gases from these rise, making the living 
rooms above unhealthful. 

The first floor of our house, — the floor on 
which we mean to live, should be tightly 
built, so as to keep out all drafts of air, and 
to leave as few^ cracks as possible for insects 
to crawl through. We shall get fresh air 
enough if we have large windows that open 
freely. 

We are fortunate, in this country, in hav- 
ing the beautiful thin shells with which our 
window sashes are filled. These are much 
better here than glass would be. They shut 



ALL AROUND THE HOUSE. 49 

out the brio'lit ravs of the sun, while thev 
can be pierced with tiny holes, if need be, 
to let in air when the window is closed. 
Heavy shutters with slats are also 2;ood. If 
we have these in the house, the windows may 
be open, even at night, or when it rains. 

The roof of our house is a very important 
part. Most of the roofs in this country are 
of nipa or bamboo. These make a good 
protection against the sun's rays, but they 
need great care, and should be often renewed, 
as the wind tears them so that they become 
leaky. They catch and hold the dust, and 
are always hatching-places for all sorts of 
insects. The roof of split bamboo is cheap, 
beautiful, and easy to make, but it is also 
easily blown away by a high wind. If we 
use it, we must fasten it with wire to the 
rafters and walls. 

Wood makes a verv bad roolins material. 
It decays quickly and is a poor protection 
against the rain. Then, too, it can hardly be 
built so that a great wind will not blow it 
away. Many roofs are now built of zinc, and 



50 HOW TO LIVE. 

for some reasons this is good material to 
make tliem of. If we have a zinc roof, how- 
ever, we must build a garret between it and 
the living rooms, — a sort of air chamber for 
the sake of coolness ; for when the sun beats 
down on the zinc roof, the metal gets very 
hot. This sort of roof is useful for catching 
rain water; after the first rain has washed 
off all the dust and dirt, then we may collect 
the rain water that falls from the roof into 
our cisterns, and have a plentiful, pure sup- 
ply during the rainy season. 

In early days roofs were covered with 
half-round red tiles. We see a great many 
of them still on old houses, but they are 
heavy, and dangerous as well during the 
typhoons and earthquakes that sometimes 
visit us. 

Perhaps the best of all roofs for this cli- 
mate are the ones covered with flat, broad 
pieces of slate, secured by wire or nails to 
boards and rafters underneath, but roofs of 
this sort are expensive. It will probably 
be best, therefore, for us to roof our house 



ALL AROUND THE HOUSE 51 

with zinc. If we have an airy garret be- 
tween it and the ceiling of the upper rooms, 
it will be quite cool enough. 

The rooms in our house will be very sim- 
ple. We shall not have any heavy, stiff 
carpets on the floors, to catch dust and 
breed disease. Nor shall there be moldings 
or ornamental ledges along the walls, be- 
cause these also catch and hold the dust. 
Our rooms shall be easy to keep clean. 
What pictures and ornaments we have on 
the walls shall be such as' can readily be 
reached and dusted. A room so decorated 
that it cannot be kept free from dust and 
dirt cannot possibly be beautiful. 

The kitchen of a house anywhere should 
be clean as can be, but particularly in this 
country. It should be on the north side of 
the house if possible, for the sake of shade. 
We will not, however, have trees growing 
very near it, even to shade it. They have 
a saying in the tropics that ''He who grows 
a tree against his house invites death to his 
door.'' This means that dampness and shade 



52 HOW TO LIVE. 

made by the trees growing too near the 
house breed disease and often bring death. 
So we shall have no trees nearer our house 
than twenty feet. 

Nor shall any one be allowed to sleep in 
our kitchen. It is a very unhealthful and 
uncleanly custom to let the servants sleep 
in the kitchen. There should be no sleep- 
ing in a room where food is prepared. By 
morning the air of a sleeping room is always 
charged with bad matter given off from the 
lungs of the sleepers. Sleeping rooms have 
a chance for ventilation during the day, and 
all these vapors are replaced by pure air. 
But there is no time in the morning to 
change the air of the kitchen. The food 
must be prepared in the midst of all the 
bad gases that have gathered there during 
the night. 

This brings us to think of w^hat proper 
sleeping arrangements should be. Not 
enough attention is given to the subject in 
this country. The nights are so hot that 
people are careless. Many grown people 



ALL AROUND THE HOUSE. 53 

and nearly all children sleep on or close to 
the floor. This custom is a great source of 
sickness. If the floor is of bamboo, the bad 
air from the earth rises through it at night. 
There is always a draft across the floor, from 
doors and from windows, and from spaces in 
the floor itself. When we are asleep the 
body is relaxed, the pores of the skin are 
open, and we are in every way less able to 
resist chills and the bad effects of impure 
air. Sleep is a condition of helplessness, 
and we should protect ourselves in it. 

A serious cause of disease, which people 
are just beginning to understand, is the 
mosquito. We have only lately come to 
know that this insect is the direct cause of 
the malaria which is so common, and so 
dangerous, here. Malaria is a germ disease. 
That is, it is a disease caused by germs 
which get into the blood. The germ of ma- 
laria is a parasite which lives on the body of 
the mosquito. We can imagine how tiny it 
must be when we know that a great many of 
them find room to live on a single mosquito. 



54 HOW TO LIVE, 

Now, when the mosquito lights on a person 
and bites him, these germs often get into 
the little puncture which the insect makes 
to draw blood. In this way they get into 
the blood of the human being, and there they 
increase in numbers very fast. They poison 
the blood, the person becomes sick and 
weak, suffers from headache and other pains, 
and very often dies at last of malaria. 

We may learn from these facts how im- 
portant it is that mosquito nets should be 
used in this country. Even if a person 
sleeps upon the floor, he should arrange some 
sort of protection from the mosquitoes. 

Every morning, the floors of our house 
must be washed with water in which we 
have put a little kerosene oil ; one or two 
large spoonfuls of oil will be enough for a 
bucket of water. We should see that the 
washing is carefully done. This washing 
with kerosene will help to keep mosquitoes 
away. It also tends to drive out ants and 
other small insects. Kerosene oil is cleans- 
ing, and helps to kill many of the germs 



ALL ABOUND THE HOUSE. 55 

tliat breed in corners and cracks. If it is 
poured upon standing water, it will prevent 
mosquitoes from breeding there. One ounce 
of kerosene will spread out over fifteen 
square feet of water, and this fact is made 
use of in some countries in getting rid of 
mosquitoes. It may be spread over the 
surface of the water in cisterns without im- 
parting any taste to the water which is 
drawn from below for drinking purposes. 

Persons who have consumption ought 
never to sleep in the same room with others, 
particularly with children. Consumption 
is catching. The germs which cause it are 
breathed out by the victim, and other people 
often inhale them and contract the disease. 
A consumptive person should never spit on 
the floor, and all discharges from the mouth 
should be disinfected. 

There are two other places about a house 
in the tropics where our arch enemy, dirt, 
may hide and slay us, if we are not on 
guard against it. These are the sinks and 
the cesspools, which receive waste from the 



56 HOW TO LIVE. 

bathroom, toilet, and such places. No refuse 
matter ought to be thrown out about the 
house, and no dirt should be allowed to 
gather on the ground floor or in the court. 
We cannot be too careful about this ; for if 
dirt does gather in these places, it is sure 
to breed disease. 

Decayed vegetables, fruit, and all leavings 
from the kitchen should be carried away and 
burned, or buried, or otherwise disposed of 
where they can do no harm. Even the water 
in which dishes are washed, or in which we 
have bathed, should not be poured out on 
the ground near the house. It should be 
carried as far away as possible and emptied 
in some waste place. 

There are few sewers in this country. 
Even those in Manila are scarcely w^orthy of 
the name. Before long, steps will have to 
be taken to have them in all cities in the 
archipelago ; for there is great need for them. 
The fact that there are no good sewers makes 
the question of cleanliness about the house 
a grave one. If waste from the toilets is 



ALL AROUND THE HOUSE. 57 

carried into the cesspools, there should be 
plenty of running water with it for flushing ; 
it should be carried in pipes to the cesspool, 
and at least once a day the water-closet 
should be flushed with water in which there 
is some good disinfectant. If, as i-s so often 
the case, the closet is merely an outhouse 
over a hole or vault dug in the earth, at least 
five liters of a mixture of quicklime and dry 
earth should be put into the vault every day. 
Milk of lime is one of the best disinfect- 
ants for use in this country. It is cheap, and 
it not only disinfects waste matter, but de- 
stroys bad odors. It is powdered quicklime 
dissolved in water, about one liter of quick- 
lime to four liters of water. Another very 
cheap, but reliable, disinfectant is made by 
dissolving three drams of mercury bichloride 
with three drams of ammonium chloride in 
a bucket of w^ater. This mixture can always 
be kept in the house and a tabo or two of it 
thrown down the closet seat whenever the 
latter is used. It must be kept where little 
children cannot meddle with it ; but a child 



58 HOW TO LIVE. 

need not be very old to be wise enough to 
use it when necessary and not to meddle 
with it. Children, as well as grown people, 
should feel in honor bound to take good care 
of the house and to tight against dirt and 
disease when these attack it. 

The bathroom and water-closet of our 
house should be kept as clean as can be. 
They should be swept and washed every day, 
and no soiled clothing or towels should be 
allowed to lie about. Our enemies, the 
mosquitoes, are very fond of hiding about 
soiled clothing or that which has been worn 
and is not soiled enough to be sent to the 
laundry. 

Soiled garments should be washed as soon 
as possible after they are taken off. Eight 
here lurks one of the greatest foes to health 
in this country. People are too careless 
about the way their garments are washed. 
The clothes often lie for several days in 
baskets or bags before going to the laundry 
or being washed. This is bad, as germs 
breed quickly among them. It is harmful 



ALL AROUND THE HOUSE. 59 

for clothes to be washed in pools or canals. 
The water of standing pools or even of 
the canals in the city is, more often than 
not, full of disease germs. 

To make matters worse, the clothes, when 
washed, are laid out on the grass to dry. All 
sorts of tiny creeping things are here ; so 




Clothes drying on the Ground. 

that while the garments look white and 
clean, they may be full of wriggling life 
from the water and from the ground, — 
creatures too small to be seen without a 
microscope, yet the cause, many times, of 
the unpleasant skin diseases so common in 
this climate. 

The laundry work of the family ought to 
be done at home, and the clothes should be 



60 



HOW TO LIVE. 



hung upon lines to dry. In other countries 
clothes are boiled after first being washed 
with soap, but this is not possible here; 
probably it never will be possible. Yet 
clothes can be washed with soap and water 
and then leached, — that is, rinsed in lye 




The Best Way to dry Clothes. 

water. Wood ashes are easy to get, and 
lye water — that is, water in which the 
ashes have been soaked — will destroy all 
germs. The clothes rinsed in it are as safe 
as those which have been boiled. 

Attention to all of these things means 



ALL AROUND THE HOUSE, 61 

work for men and women, and for the boys 
and girls who wish to feel that their 
house is really their castle which they are 
defending against unseen foes. These foes 
are harder to fight than those who come 
openly and slay with the sword. They are 
more dangerous foes, moreover ; for they 
are about us always, and must be fought 
daily. Otherwise, they will rob us of health, 
of comfort, of sight ; they will make us the 
victims of disease which is ugly to look 
upon and painful to bear. They even take 
from us life itself, unless we are constantly 
on guard to fight their great helper, the dirt, 
which gathers about any neglected spot. 

QUESTIONS. 

What sort of site should be chosen to build a home 
upon? 

How should the foundation be prepared ? 

Why is it unhealthful to live near the ground in the 
tropics ? 

Why is it unwise to keep animals under the houses? 

What is the best sort of roof in this country ? 

How should the kitchen be located ? 

Why should no one be allowed to sleep in the kitchen ? 



62 HOW TO LIVE, 

Why is it not healthful to sleep on the floor ? 
How should the body be protected during sleep ? 
How do mosquitoes cause malaria ? 
How does the use of kerosene oil keep them away? 
Why should consumptives never sleep in the room 
with healthy persons ? 

How should refuse matter be disposed of ? 
What are some of the best cheap disinfectants ? 
How should clothes be washed? 
How should they be dried ? 




CHAPTER V. 
OUR OWN SELVES. 

HUMAN being is very wonder- 
ful. Even the smallest baby 
is entirely separate from all 
the rest of the world. He is 
a part of the great whole, but he has his 
own life and separate being, just as much 
as the greatest man in the world. H every- 
body in the world did just what was right 
excepting one man, both that man and the 
rest of the world would suffer because of his 
doing wrong. If all the rest of the world 
were healthy and clean and he was not, the 
cleanliness and health of all the others 
would not save him from beingi; dirtv and 
unhealthy. Each one of us must do all 
that he can to help the rest of the world 
to be good and healthy and clean. Now, the 
first and greatest thing that any one of us 

63 



64 HOW TO LIVE. 

can do toward this, is to do right and be 
healthy and clean himself. 

The human being is not only very won- 
derful, but he lives in a wonderful body. 
This body can do much and endure much. 
It is very perfectly adapted to its use. If 
man had not his reason to help him; if he 
did not walk upright when all other crea- 
tures crawl or go on all fours ; if he did not 
differ from the lower animals in any other 
way than by having a thumb on each hand, 
he w^ould still be superior to them. All the 
other large creatures are stronger than man, 
but his skillful hands, with their thumbs, 
make him master of them. These help him 
to grasp and to hold, to make things for his 
own use. He makes clothing to wear, houses 
to shelter himself, and w^eapons with which 
to defend himself. 

Hundreds of years ago there lived a great 
doctor, named Galen. He wrote one of the 
first books ever written about the human 
body, and he has left it on record that he was 
obliged to believe that God lives; for none 



OUR OWN SELVES. 65 

but divine power could have made so won- 
derful a thing as the joint that turns the 
human hand at the wrist. Yet this joint is 
only one of the many wonderful things in 
the body. 

Now, to each of us is intrusted one of 
these bodies to take care of, that it may do 
our work for us. Our work is not just to live 
for ourselves, but to do something useful in 
the world ; to help it all to be better because 
we are here. So you see how very much 
worth while it is that we should keep these 
useful bodies of ours as well and strong as 
we can. 

Besides the outer garments in which we 
clothe it, the body has a garment of its own. 
This garment is never laid aside; and though 
it is in constant use, it never wears out. 
We call it the skin. The skin is meant to 
protect the body. Lying close under it are 
many nerve ends, delicate blood vessels, oil 
glands, sweat glands, and other tiny organs 
that are too small to be seen without a mi- 
croscope, but which are needed to keep the 



66 



HOW TO LIVE, 



body in good order. In the pictures which 
are shown on this page, you will see how 




Mlfi 




Fi-. 1. 



Fig. 2. 



The Skin Magnified. 
Fig. 1. Surface showing openings of pores. 
Fig. 2. Side view of sweat glands and pores. 

these tiny organs look w^hen they are many 
times magnified. 

Now, like our outer clothing, this garment 
of the body needs to be kept very clean. 
You know that in this country when we 
take exercise, or, during the heat of the day, 
even w^ithout our taking exercise, the surface 



OUR OWN SELVES, 67 

of the skin gets moist, little drops of water 
stand on it, and even run down our faces 
or make our hands wet. We call this 
moisture jjersjnration, and say that we are 
sweating or perspiring with the heat. The 
drops of water come from openings in the 
skin, which we call pores. These are little 
tubes connecting Avith sweat glands below 
the skin. You will see in the picture how 
these sweat glands look, and how the pores 
come to the surface. 

The perspiration is not pure, clean water ; 
it contains many impurities which the lungs, 
kidneys, and other organs have not cast 
out from the body. It is the work of the 
skin to help carry off these impurities, and 
it does this by means of sweat glands and 
pores. If the perspiration dries on the skin, 
the impurities remain ; they stop up the pores 
and make the body unhealthy. It is to pre- 
vent all this that we bathe often. Bathing 
keeps the pores of the skin open and the 
skin itself in a healthy condition. We use 
soap because the skin secretes oil as well as 



68 HOW TO LIVE. 

perspiration. This oil is to keep it soft and 
smooth, but it is needful that the excess of 
it should be washed off with soap, in order 
that the oil glands may not become clogged. 
We should be very careful not to become 
chilled when in a perspiration. We should 
not plunge into cold water at this time. 
Neglect of this rule often causes bowel 
trouble, and is a great cause of the catarrh 
and bronchitis so common among the Fili- 
pino people. To keep it perfectly clean, 
the body should be washed with soap once 
a day. Just before noon is the best time to 
bathe, or else about four o'clock in the af- 
ternoon. One should never bathe right after 
eating. If one takes a sponge bath with 
water alone, immediately on rising, one feels 
better all day, but, in this climate, the bath 
with soap is needed as well. Babies and 
very little children should be bathed with 
soap and water without being plunged into 
the bath. They are delicate, and unable to 
withstand the chill that might result. Chills 
are very dangerous, and a person should 



OUR OWN SELVES. 69 

be careful in the rainy season not to get 
drenched. 

A person who has any kind of skin trouble 
should be very careful not to give it to any 
one else. He owes it to all others to take 
pains about this. If he does not, he is not 
a good citizen. He should be careful not 
to use the towels that any one else is likely 
to use, and his soiled clothing, when taken 
off, should be disinfected before being sent 
to the laundry. 

The custom of going barefoot is a danger- 
ous one. The sole of the foot is a very deli- 
cate surface ; a great many nerves and blood 
vessels center in the instep, and any injury 
to these may produce the disease called 
lockjaw, which usually results fatally. Even 
if nothing so serious as this happens, the 
foot is often injured by bruising or by other 
hurts. The feet are susceptible to chill, 
especially in the rainy season, when they 
should be kept dry and warm. Disease is 
often taken through the feet, especially such 
diseases as the bubonic plague, and the dif- 



70 HOW TO LIVE. 

ferent kinds of itch which are known in the 
tropics. Aside from all these reasons why 
we should dress the feet, it is an untidy i)rac- 
tice to go barefoot. The low shoes without 
fastenings, into which so many Filipinos 
thrust their feet, give people who wear them 
an awkward, shuffling walk. A shoe which 
fits the foot well and is fastened upon it so 
that it does not flap at the heel is the only 
one that should be worn out-of-doors, and 
no shoes should be worn without stock- 
ings. 

Every boy or girl who wants to be well 
must take exercise. If w^e do not use our 
muscles, they become weak and small. The 
brain sufi'ers as well. When we exercise we 
not only strengthen our muscles, but we set 
the blood in quicker circulation. The heart 
must work faster; the lungs must expand 
more ; the food digests better and the brain 
is clearer. The best sort of exercise is use- 
ful work out-of-doors or about the house, but 
boys and girls need to play as well as work. 
All games that take them out-of-doors and 



OUR OWN SELVES. 71 

make tliem move about actively are good for 
them. 

Many Filii)ino boys and girls do one thing 
that is very hnrtful ; that is, they smoke. 
The use of tobacco injures growing young 
people. It stunts the growth, so that even 
when grown they are small and weak. Boys 
who smoke do not grow so fast or so large 
as those who do not. Smoking injures the 
memory and makes people heavy and stupid; 
it makes them less inclined to take exercise, 
and so the muscles become weak ; it hurts 
the digestion and makes the stomach weak. 
Besides these things, it induces the constant 
spitting so common in this country; a]id 
we have seen how hurtful this waste of the 
saliva is. 

Chewing betel nut is even worse than 
smoking. If all of the betel juice is not spit 
out, some of it will be swallowed, and this 
is very bad indeed, as the betel acts like a 
jwison on the system. So the betel chewer 
must waste all the saliva that comes into his 
mouth while he is chewing the nut. More 



72 HOW TO LIVE. 

than this, he stains the sidewalks and floors 
with the filthy stnff, and makes himself ugly 
to look at, as well as offensive to cleanliness. 
It is to be hoped that the boys and girls who 
study this book will never take up such a 
disgusting habit. 

Still another thing which is very bad for 
the health in this country is the use of alco- 
hol. Alcohol is bad for the system ; it irri- 
tates the delicate lining of the food canal, and 
hurts the liver and the kidneys. 

We have said that tuba, the juice from the 
cocoanut tree, is good and refreshing to drink 
when just drawn from the tree; but in a few 
hours after it is drawn changes begin to take 
place in it. The greatest of these changes 
we' call fermentation ; it is caused by tiny 
vegetable growths, called ferments. These 
are too small to be seen unless magnified, 
but they float about in the air. They get into 
the tuba, and, because there is something 
there which they like and thrive upon, they 
grow and increase in numbers very fast. 
They separate the sugar of the tuba into the 



OUR OWN SELVES. 73 

parts that make up sugar, and take from it 
the part which they like. What is left forms 
two other things. One is a poisonous gas, 
called carbonic acid gas. 

At one stage in the fermenting process, 
there is a great deal of this carbonic acid gas 
in the tuba, and that is what gives it its 
dreadful taste when it first begins to ivork 
or fei^meiit. The other thing found in the 
tuba is alcohol. If this were not distilled, 
the tuba would simply go on working until 
all the sugar was gone ; then it would be as 
sour as vinegar and disagreeable to drink. 
But distillers heat it until it boils ; the alcohol 
rises and j^asses off into a vessel especially 
prepared to receive it, and becomes the drink 
called hino. This drink is really an active 
poison to most people. If a man drinks much 
of it he becomes crazy, his actions are dan- 
gerous to society, and at last he has to be 
kept in confinement. Often he does terrible 
mischief under the influence of bino. 

It is very fortunate for this country that 
Filipinos know how dangerous it is to drink 



74 HOW TO LIVE, 

this stuff. Still, there are some weak and 
foolish people who think that they can stand 
it, and who drink it until they form a habit 
which holds them in bondage. 

None of the alcohol made in this country 
is refined ; therefore it is full of impurities 
and very poisonous. Those who know the 
climate agree that the less alcohol of any 
sort one uses here, the better. Those sol- 
diers and others who let it quite alone are 
the ones who best withstand the bad effects 
of the tropics and keep well and strong. 
Alcohol weakens the brain sooner than it 
does any other part of the body. A person 
cannot think clearly when he has had too 
much ; he cannot walk straight, and often a 
man does things under its influence which 
he never would do if he had not been 
drinking it 

There are five different ways in which a 
person can tell something of what is going 
on around him. He can see, he can hear, 
smell, or touch some things, and some he 
can also taste. We call these five faculties 



OUR OWN SELVES. 75 

of man the special senses. Each of these 
special senses has its own home in the body, 
its own organ to do its work. For instance, 
the eyes see, the ears hear, the organs of 
taste are in the mouth, those of the smell in 
the nose, while the sense of touch is every- 
where in the body where there are any 
nerves. 

In this country the organs of the special 
senses need great care. There are a 
great many blind i)eople here, who have 
become blind because they have not under- 
stood how to take care of the eyes. The 
lids and the eyelashes are meant to protect 
the eyes and keep out dust, to prevent in- 
sects, etc., from getting into them. 

Nature has taken wonderful pains to pro- 
tect our eyes, but we must do all we can to 
help her. She has prepared a fluid which 
washes the balls, but the outside of the eyes 
as well should be carefully washed once or 
twice a day, and wiped dry. We should be 
very particular to wipe them on a clean 
cloth. We should never use a towel that is 



76 HOW TO LIVE. 

used by any one who has any trouble with 
the eyes or who has any skin disease. The 
eyes should never be rubbed with the fin- 
gers. When any foreign matters, as specks 
of dust, or cinders, get into them, we should 
go at once to some skillful physician to have 
them removed. We should shade the eyes 
from the direct rays of the sun. If we walk 
out in the middle of the day, we should carry 
an umbrella or wear a broad hat. We should 
not strain the eyes, or use them when they 
are tired or when the light is bad. 

Alcohol is very bad for the eyes ; it luakes 
them weak. The eyes of a hard drinker 
become red and watery. Such a person may 
often become blind. Tobacco, too, causes 
dimness of sight, and has been known to 
produce blindness. 

Strange as it may seem, the ears are even 
more delicate than the eyes, and more readily 
injured; and when hurt, there is less that 
science can do for them. The outer ear only 
catches sound and turns it inward. The 
parts of the ear that really hear are deep in 



OUR OTr.V SELVES, 



i i 



the head, where they can be well protected. 

The little canal leading into the ear secretes 

wax, which hinders insects from craw^ling 

in. Sometimes they do get in, despite the 

wax. In some parts of this country, there 

are leeches that get into the ear. When 

they do this they cause great pain and often 

produce deafness. We should never try to 

pick or lift anything 

of this sort out of the 

ear. The best way, 

when anything alive 

gets into the ear, is 

to pour in a little 

quantity of oil. This 

nearly always causes 

the creature which 

has gotten in to back 

out, in order to escape the oil. If, instead 

of coming out, it is drowned, it must be 

removed by some skillful physician. 

Nothing should ever be inserted in the 
ear for the purpose of cleaning it except the 
little finger. The ear should be washed 




The Ear. 

Showing the drum and hones. 



78 HOW TO LIVE, 

very carefully with soap and water and 
dried thoroughly. Sometimes, when swim- 
ming, people get water into their ears. They 
should shake it out at once, or the ears may 
ache. Sometimes water that gets in this 
way causes inflammation and cold, which 
hurt the sense of hearing. No one should 
ever strike another on the ear, even in play. 
It is likely to cause deafness. What is 
called the drum of the ear is a very delicate 
membrane which receives the sound. This 
is what really hears, and a blow on the side 
of the head may rupture this membrane and 
destroy the hearing. 

The sense of smell is high up in the nose. 
It is a very useful sense and warns us of 
danger. We can often detect bad air by its 
odor. We know whether food is good or 
whether it is spoiled, by its smell. 

We taste things with the tongue. Sub- 
stances which do not dissolve in water have 
no taste. Even our food would have no taste 
if it were dry. The saliva must disolve it 
before we can taste it. We can hurt the 



OUR OWN SELVES. 79 

sense of taste by eating too fast, or by season- 
ing our food too strongly with pepper and 
other hot spices. Chewing the betel nut 
helps to destroy the sense of taste, and so 
does much use of alcohol. We need the 
sense of taste to tell us whether food is good 
or bad. Food which has a pleasant taste is 
more easily digested than that which we do 
not like. 

The sense of touch tells us whether 
things are hard or soft ; it tells us when we 
are hurt. It does this by the feeling which 
we call pain. If we did not feel pain when 
we were being injured, we might be killed 
before we could know of our danger and pro- 
tect ourselves from it. 

So we see how true it is that our bodies 
are wonderful machines. But they are some- 
thing besides machines, — they are houses 
in which the soul dwells, and as such they 
are worthy of great care and honor. We 
must keep them clean. It is our duty to 
feed them right and guard them from injury. 
We should be careful, too, never to injure 



80 BOW TO LIVE. 

them ourselves by putting them to uses not 
clean and pure, or by making them ac- 
customed to things which are bad for them. 
When we do any of these things, we hurt the 
soul, as well as the body, and bring shame 
upon ourselves and sorrow to others. 

QUESTIONS. 

Why should we try to keep our bodies well and strong? 

What is perspiration ? 

Why should we bathe often ? 

How should children be bathed ? 

When is the best time to bathe ? 

Why is it imprudent to go barefoot in the tropics? 

Is smoking hurtful to boys and girls ? 

What does it do ? 

Why is betel chewing injurious? 

How does alcohol affect those who drink it to excess ? 

What is its effect on the mind? On the eyes? 

How do we tell what is going on about us ? 

What are the organs of the five senses ? 

How can we best take care of our eyes ? Of our ears ? 

What tells us when we are hurt ? 

What is our duty toward our bodies ? 




CHAPTER VI. 

PUBLIC HYGIENE. 

^NE of the great questions in which 
governments in all countries 
are interested is how to keep 
down the death rate in great 
cities. In olden times there were many 
plagues and epidemics. These often de- 
stroyed thousands of lives. People did not 
understand why the plagues came; they 
used to think them punishments for sin, or 
sent by some evil spirit out of hatred to 
humanity. They did not knoAV how to meet 
them or how to take care of those whom the 
plagues attacked, and so whole cities were 
sometimes emptied by disease before which 
the science of those days was helpless. 

But now we have come to know that all 
epidemics have natural causes. An epidemic 
is always caused either by bad water or 

81 



82 HOW TO LIVE, 

neglected sewers or poisonous gases arising 
from long-gathered filth. In Europe and in 
America every city has its system or sys- 
tems of sewers, its boards of public health 
and of street cleaning. Great care is taken, 
and enormous sums of money are spent, to 
keep the cities clean, that the people may 
be as healthy as possible. 

Manila, the capital city of the Philippines, 
is one of the largest cities on the Asiatic 
coast. It has been, in the past, in very bad 
condition because of filth. One of the first 
things the Americans began to do when they 
came here was to try to make the city clean, 
so that it would be more healthful. This 
was a very difficult thing to do, because of 
the dirt which had been allowed to gather 
during many years. It was also difficult 
because of the way in which the city of 
Manila is built. The ground is low and 
marshy. Two feet below the surface of the 
earth under the city, water is found almost 
everywhere. This keeps the earth damp. 
Those who built houses in the past knew 



PUBLIC HYGIENE, 83 

this, SO tliey laid cement floors in the base- 
ments of their buildings. 

But the cement floors were not made as 
they should have been. Instead of digging 
down into the earth and filling in the exca- 
vation, builders spread the cement on the 
surface of the ground and then built their 
walls around this platform. The cement 
which has been used here is not the best for 
such a country as this. It is what is called 
Roman cement, very porous, and not hard 
and solid, as is the Portland cement in use in 
America. The walls of the houses, as well 
as the ground floors, were very often of this 
cement. 

If you take a lamp w4ck and hold one end 
of it in oil, before long not only that end 
but the whole wick is wet with the oil. This 
is because the porous fibers of the wick have 
soaked up the oil. Now, these porous walls 
of the houses in Manila take up the moisture 
from the earth, so that many of them are 
completely soaked with w^ater. When this 
is the case, mold begins to grow on the walls. 



84 



HOW TO LIVE. 



It is not unusual to see walls quite over- 
grown with green mold and moss that always 
feels a little damp to the touch. 




Gate covered with Unhbalthful Mold. 



This growth on the walls is a great hurt 
to the health of people living in the houses. 
It breeds disease, and keeps the moisture in 
the walls, so that the houses are damp and 
unw^holesome. It is of no use to shut our 



PUBLIC HYGIENE. 85 

windows at niglit, for the early morning cliill 
that we hope thus to shut out is in the walls 
themselves. It is far better to leave the 
windows open, that fresh air may come in 
and drive out some of the poisonous vapors 
that rise from the walls and creep into the 
house. The walls of the house should be 
kept clean of mold. They should be scraped 
and whitewashed very often, and the green, 
unhealthy growth kept down. 

In the cities of Europe and America there 
are great sewer systems to take the waste 
and refuse from the houses and carry it far 
from the city. The sewers empty into the 
sea or into drainage canals, and thence to 
points where the sewage can be destroyed 
so that it will not endanger life. The city 
of Manila has some sewers. We can see the 
openings into them in the streets. They 
are small, square openings, covered with 
stone. But the sewers that run through the 
streets empty into the open moat that sur- 
rounds the walled city ! It will become 
necessary, before many years, to fill this 



86 HOW TO LIVE, 

moat, to save the people of Manila frombeiPx^ 
killed by the gases that rise from it. 

Damp walls, damp floors^ damp rooms 
close to the ground, make the very best sort 
of places for dirt to gather. It is not enough 
that walls should be scraped and floors 
cleaned once in a while ; they must be kept 
clean all the time. This is why sanitary 
inspectors go about the city to examine 
houses and walls and report on their con- 
dition. We should be glad that they do 
this; for we know that if they are faithful 
about it, the city will be more healthful 
and many lives will be saved. 

The dirt that gathers in the streets is of 
many sorts. A great deal is made by the 
horses and carabaos, mules and oxen, that 
draw loads about the city. The wheels of 
the vehicles, too, grind the stone pavement 
to dust, and this is blown about by the wind. 
Dead leaves drop from the trees, choke up 
the gutters, and, left to themselves, will 
make sodden masses of decayed vegetation 
in corners. Waste paper blows about, and 



PUBLIC HYGIENE, 87 

all sorts of unclean things are thrown into 
the streets by careless people. It takes a 
small army of laborers to keep the streets in 
order. They go over the city with brooms, 
shovels, and dust-boxes, and sweep and 
gather up refuse and dirt. They put it into 
carts and take it away to where it is loaded 
upon barges and sent out to sea, or used to 
fill in low places where it can do no harm. 

There is a great deal that each of us can 
do to help keep the streets clean. No one 
should ever do anything that is likely to leave 
any dirt about them. Banana and orange 
peel should never be thrown on the sidewalk. 
This is not only a dirty and untidy trick, but 
often a bit of peel does serious mischief ; a 
person may step upon one, slij), and get a 
very dangerous fall. 

School children are the very best sort of 
helpers to the street-cleaning department. 
They can form what are called '' Good- 
Government '' clubs or societies, to help. 
They can keep a sharp lookout for careless 
people who are about to throw paper or fruit 



88 HOW TO LIVE, 

parings into the street. When they see any 
one doing this, they should not be afraid to 
remind him that it is a dangerous and an un- 
tidy thing to do. Most great cities now pro- 
vide sheet-iron boxes along the sidewalks to 
receive all these things. We should have them 
in Manila. The children could then point 
them out to any one who needed to have 
his attention called to them. If they saw 
paper or peelings lying about, the boys might 
pick them up, if no street-cleaner were near, 
and put them into the boxes. We may be 
sure that girls and boys who were thus care- 
ful, never would do anything themselves to 
make the city untidy. They would not throw 
paper and peelings about, nor spit upon the 
sidewalks. Even school children ought to 
remember that they are growing up to be 
citizens. They cannot begin too young to take 
pride in their city or town or village and try 
to make it one of the best-governed places in 
the country. They should take pride in keep- 
ing school buildings nice. Even if these 
buildings are old, as so many are, at present, 
LolC, 



PUBLIC HYGIENE, 89 

in tlie islands, they can still be kept so clean 
that any one entering will know that the 
pnpils are self-governing, orcler-loving boys 
and girls, who will some day be self-gov- 
erning and order-loving citizens. 

The elements of good living are, after all, 
very simple. If we would live long and keep 
our bodies in condition to do their work, we 
must be clean. We must have clean surround- 
ings; we must drink pure water and eat 
clean, wholesome food. We must not eat 
or drink things that will hurt us. We must 
do nothing that will make our bodies less 
fit dwelling-places for our souls. We must 
be honest and kind, ready to helii and to 
take part in keeping everything about us 
clean and well ordered. Thus we shall be 
useful citizens, each ready to do his own part 
to make this world the place it should be. 

QUESTIONS. 

What are the causes of epidemics ? 
Why are damp walls and floors unhealthful ? 
Is it best, in this country, to sleep with our windows 
closed ? 



90 HOW TO LIVE. 

Where should sewers empty ? 

Why is the sewer system of Manila a bad one ? 

What sort of dirt gathers in the streets ? 

How can school children help to keep the city clean ? 

What should we all try to do if we would live long ? 

Why is it our duty to do these things ? 



MA> Si 



imp. 



MY 31 19U2 



1 COPY DEL. TO CAT. rnV. 
MAY 31 1902 



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